Laughter to Love
by SirAmbala
Summary: Their return fron Kyoto brought a short lived peace, but now Kenhin isn't sure what to do anymore. He is really beggining to wonder if he is ever supposed to be happy.


A/N: I don't own either of them, hope you enjoy.

ooOOoo

Things have changed much since our return from Kyoto. Upon nearing the dojo Miss Karou had turned to me and welcomed me home. It was the first time in ten years that I had truly felt at home. It would seem though that things are never supposed to be good for me, but I will keep a smile on my face if she is happy.

About two months after our return things were going well. Yahiko had continued his training and there hadn't been too many people wanting revenge on me, for once things seemed to be quiet. That was until one day a young man came looking for the master of the Kamiya Kasshin style. Miss Karou informed him that her father had passed many years ago, and that she was the assistant instructor. He then told her that he was one of her father's first students. To say she was ecstatic was an understatement. The two of them have been off in their own little world since then. They speak of spreading her father's teachings among other things. To say I wasn't a tad jealous would be a lie. Though I never told her, she was the reason I made it back from the fight with Shishio alive. I can see a light in her eye that wasn't there before, it would be wrong of me to hold her back. I also see the distrust in his eyes once he found out who I used to be. The others have accepted me for who I was and who I am, but I can see this man never will. He cares about Miss Karou, and sees me as a danger to her. It would be a lie if I said it wasn't true. Though I will not become the manslayer again there are many that come and put her in danger, so to save everyone the trouble I have decided to wander once again.

I pack what few things I have and make my way to the gate while the others are sound asleep. I know I should tell them, but I don't know if I will have the resolve if they knew. Quietly as possible I open the gate and quickly make my way out, only to end up on the ground as a fist makes contact with my face. I look up in surprise to see Sano pulling his fist back. He informs me that he is not getting left behind again. He says that he knows why I am leaving, and doesn't blame me. I know I shouldn't be, but I am glad that he is coming. I'm not sure I have what it takes to be a wanderer anymore, not after the easy life the last year and a half.

In the dead of night the two of us head for the outskirts of town. As we pass a shrine I feel and odd pull toward it. Against my better judgment I start climbing the many steps toward the top. Sano calls for me to stop, but for some reason I can't. Once at the top I make my way towards an old looking shed that houses a well…

ooOOoo

"Who are you and what are you doing here?"

"Oro…"

"Kenshin are you okay?"

"Yes Sano I am okay."

"Good…now what the heck were you thinking?"

"Oro"

"Would you answer us and tell us what you are doing here?"

"They are probably demons."

"I will show you demon!"

"Wait Sano, violence is not the answer now, that it is not."

"All of you, that is enough!"

"Miko-sama, we found intruders in the forest."

"I see that, good job. Now return to the village I will take over from here."

"But Miko-sama."

"No buts, return to the village and get some rest. Both of you have to be up early in the morning."

I took this time to study the young girl in front of us. She looked no older than twenty and wore the traditional robe of a shrine maiden. She had flowing black hair with a blue tint to it. On her hip was a sword and slug across her back was a bow.

"I apologize for their behavior, they are not very welcoming of newcomers I'm afraid. It is not safe in the forest at night, it would be best if we went to the village."

"I agree, the forest is giving off bad vibes. We will be more than happy to go with you Miko-sama."

"Just Kagome if you please. Even after all this time I can't get most of the villagers to call me by my name."

"Well then Miss Kagome lead the way."

"I guess that's a start. This way now, and be careful of the roots. This forest can be treacherous at night."

"That's Kenshin for you, always the polite one."

"Oh how rude of me. My name is Himura Kenshin and my friend is Sagara Sanoske."

"It is a pleasure to meet both of you. Ah we are back the hut it would seem."

After the young Miko got a fire started and we were comfortable the questioning began.

"Well I guess the first thing I should ask you is what year you come from."

"What do you mean by year?"

"I have a strong connection to the well, and I felt it activate not long ago. After that I felt unknown auras in the forest and decided to go investigate. I am the protector of this village, and try to stop any harm to come to it. The sooner I find the source the better."

"If I may ask what exactly do you eliminate, and why are we still alive then?"

"Oh how silly of me. I can assure you I have never killed a human before. This village is plagued by many demon attacks, and I as a Miko have the power to purify them."

We both gave her confused looks.

"Judging by the deer in the headlights look I would say you have never heard of demons, and don't know that they exist. Which leads me back to my first question as to what year are you from?"

"Miss Kagome we come from the twelfth year of the Meji. Are you trying to tell us we are in a different time?"

"How else do you explain the forest and lack of city around you?"

"Okay say we are in some other time, how would you know about the city?"

She got up from her seat on the floor and went to look out the window.

"I should know, I was born in Tokyo. I grew up in a future five hundred years from now. I lived on the shrine where the well and the God Tree are. I had heard all the legends and myths from my grandfather who ran the shrine. It wasn't until the fifteenth birthday that I believed any of them. I was pulled into the well and brought here by a demon."

"Okay cameras and trains are bad enough, but now this?"

"What's wrong with those?"

"I train is a tea kettle and a camera sucks your soul out!"

"You will have to excuse Sano; he does not like new things."

"What's wrong with the way things were?"

"I will admit that some of the new things from the rest are odd, it is time that change happened. Japan cannot run the way it used to. If not what did we fight the revolution for?"

"You mean the Meji Revolution?"

"Yes, do you know of it?"

"What any teenager did. It was covered in my history class. At the time I found it quite fascinating. You said we, does that mean you fought in the revolution?"

"Yeah, my boy Kenshin here is the single reason the Meji era is even here, or well there."

"Sano it is not something to be proud of. I killed many men…"

"I thought something seemed familiar about you, and your last name proves it. You were know as Hitokiri the Battosai or Himura the Battosai. You were an assassin that went by the dark of night to carry out your deeds. It seemed that no one could touch you. It was because of you that the Imperialists won and the peace that followed the chaos existed. Of course that is all the text books said. I was quite fascinated by you when I was younger I must say."

"You shouldn't have been. What I did wasn't something for fun or for glory. I did it because I wished there to be peace, and for everyone to live a good life."

"Your disappearance as the chaos was coming to a close said just that. If you had done it for your own selfish reasons you would have finished it out and wanted recognition for what you had accomplished. Instead you disappeared until ten years later when your predecessor started causing trouble again."

"If I may ask Miss Kagome, how is it that you know so much about me?"

"Like I said I was intrigued by you, so I dug up every book I could find. None of them had anything past the revolution so I started rummaging through the many scrolls on our shrine. It would seem that the shrine kept much information on Tokyo through its development. There was a nice chunk written about you by someone known as Katsu."

"Katsu, but I wonder why he did that."

"You know him?"

"Yes he is a very good friend of mine. He was more interested in getting rid of the Meji government last time I checked though. Though I do believe Kenshin made quite the impression on him."

"Perhaps he wished to tell the real story, and not the one that was by rumor. Either way it told of what you became after the revolution, and all the good that you did."

"I am glad, that I am. I would not have wanted you to think I was right for what I did."

"You fought for what you believed was right, there is no wrong in that. The only wrong anyone can do is to do nothing, and complain about the way things are."

"You have a very interesting way of looking at things Miss Kagome. Now enough about my past how is it that you are here?"

"I fell down the well…"

"We get that, what are you still doing here?"

"Oh right. There is a jewel of great power. It can grant any wish, and many demons wanted it. I am the reincarnation of the jewels last protector and was born with it inside of me. Upon coming here many demons wanted it. I broke it into many pieces on accident. With the help of a half demon named Inuyasha we gathered the shards. One shard could increase a demons power tenfold. Along our journey we were joined by a Kitsune kit, a monk, and a demon slayer. Our arch enemy Naraku always seemed to be a step ahead of us. Finally three years later we defeated him thus putting the entire jewel back together. After all the hardships we faced the five of us had become very close, a family of sorts. I had made many trips back to my time, but was finding it harder and harder to do so. There I felt out of place and longed for the open spaced. My friends there were foreign and immature to me. After a hard decision I decided to leave my real family behind and live here full time. The monk and demon slayer married soon after, and I mated with Inuyasha. Mating is like marriage for demons, only more binding. I loved him more than anything. Many thought I was insane for loving the one thing I was supposed to despise, but I guess not being born here and hating demons changed my perspective. There are some demons that are bad, and those that are good. Humans are really not so different. Not all of them are good, and not all of them are bad."

"Miss Kagome is there a reason you are speaking in past tense?"

"Besides the random attacks from demons wanting the jewel the year after Naraku's defeat was peaceful. Sango and Miroku had their first child and Inuyasha and I were doing well. Shippou was training to get stronger, and it was good. The day after our one year celebration we were attacked. No one saw it coming. At that time I was weak. I had gotten better than the beginning, but I still wasn't all that strong. Inuyasha always had to protect me, and on that day it was not different. The only thing that changed was that he didn't make it out alive…"

I watched as the strong girl from the forest became a young woman grieving for that which she had lost. I could see the haunted look in here eye, the one that you get when you lose a lover. I should know, I cut through my lover.

"It will be okay Miss Kagome that it will."

"I know I'm sorry. I promised myself I wouldn't cry over it again. I promised myself I would get stronger and not make his sacrifice in vain. He would be rolling in his grave if he saw me upset. He never liked to see my tears."

"Of course he wouldn't, a pretty girl such as yourself shouldn't be anything but happy."

"There's my man Kenshin, think she is pretty do you?"

"Oro"

My attention turned away from my so called best friend to the teary eyed girl. She was rolling on the ground laughing. Normally I do not like being laughed at, but to see her smile made my heart flutter for some reason. I hadn't meant to say it out loud, but I wasn't someone like her should never be crying.

"I'm sad we missed the joke, it takes a lot to get her to laugh anymore."

BAM

"My dear Sango what was that for?"

"You know Sango that the more you do that the more brain cells he is going to lose."

"You and I both know he doesn't have any left Kagome. Now would you like to introduce us to your new friends?"

"Whoops my bad again. This is Himura Kenshin and Sagara Sanoske. They seem to have been victims of the well. There from about three hundred years in the future."

"This is interesting and all, but it is late and I need sleep."

"Blunt, I like him already."

"You would Monk."

"Well Kagome we were just coming to say goodnight. Don't forget we are next door if you need anything."

"Thanks Sango, don't worry about me. Lady Kaede will be back tomorrow with Shippou and Rin."

"That means he will be here as well."

"Yep old uptight will be here to fetch Rin, she has been with us for a couple weeks now. It also means I will be training with him."

"I figured; well don't stay up late then. We will get better introduced in the morning; it was nice meeting you two. Come on Miroku."

"Yes dear…"

"Well Sano you can go to bed. I just need to finish a couple things up and I will be following. The extra mats are in the corner."

"Thanks missy, night."

She stood up and cracked some of her joints. I cringed a little bit, that sound bothered me. She then made her way out the door. Deciding I wouldn't be able to sleep at all I followed her outside. She was sitting at the base of the tree next to the hut looking at the stars.

"It's an old habit I picked up while we travelled. I always marveled at how many stars can be seen when your out in the open."

"I know, I did it often as well on my travels."

"It must have been lonely."

"I was able to help people, and that made my happy. I wished to atone for all the lives I had taken. I see now that I will never be able to do that, and live a good life. I've come to see that if I do not value my own life, I can never truly value another's life."

"I see. I can't say I fully understand, but everyone deserves a good life. Especially one such as you that has done so much good."

"Many do not see it the same way. They wish to take revenge on me for those lives that I have taken."

"They are fools then."

"Perhaps, perhaps not. I cannot blame them for their pain, and I was the reason for it."

"If it hadn't been you it would have been someone else. People are always looking for someone to blame, you are just their scapegoat. Revenge never solves anything, once done there is still an empty feeling inside. If they were to kill you their loved one would never come back."

I looked at the girl next to me in wonder. I had never had it explained to me in that fashion before.

"Why do you look surprised? It is the truth after all, it's just human nature. It is also human nature not to listen to what people say to you so I know you will continue blaming yourself, so if it helps any I can guarantee me and those of this village don't care."

"What?"

"We don't care who you are, or what you have done in the past. The only thing I judge people on is what they are in the here and now. Not everyone has a good past, and it's what you do with it determines who you are. If you had continued killing things would be different, but you put your bloody blade down and picked up another to help those in need. I always admired you for that, and I am quite honored to actually meet you."

I was at a loss for words. Even Miss Karou had not been this vocal about accepting me. This girl knew about me, but still had just met me.

"Well since you're not going to say anything lets head in and go to bed. We can figure out what to do with you two in the morning."

With that she walked in to hut and I looked at the stars once more. The only thing I remember before waking up here was a voice telling me happiness was closer than I thought. This might not be the right decision but I want my heart to flutter once more. It might be selfish, but I want to make sure that girl can keep smiling. Perhaps coming here was the right thing after all.

ooOOo

A/N: The End

Actually that would be kind of cruel wouldn't it?

ooOOoo

The Kamiya Dojo was not what it used to. There was still the swish of a sword as those inside practiced, but the enthusiasm wasn't there anymore. There was no yelling or laughter echoing throughout the yard, and the number of occupants had dropped. It had been six months since Kenshin and Sanoske disappeared and those they left behind still hadn't gotten over the loss. Karou especially was saddened. It wasn't until Kenshin was gone did she realized what she had done. Her new fiancé always did his best to cheer her up, but he knew the once manslayer had quite the effect on the household. He now wished he hadn't been so mean to the small red head and given him a chance. Yahiko still aimed to get stronger, but without Kenshin's presence it seems his motivation was lacking.

As the three of them went about their boring daily routine a group of three people made their way through the front gate of the dojo. Having heard the intrusion Karou and Yahiko grabbed their wooden swords and headed for the gate. It was what they saw standing in the front yard that stopped them in their tracks.

In the middle of the group stood a small red head with a cross shaped scar on his cheek. To his left was a girl with long bluish black hair and to his right stood a tall man with spiky black hair. The red head had a nervous smile on his face as he eyed his once friends.

"Kenshin"

"It has been a long time that it has, I am glad to see that you are both doing well."

ooOOoo

He sat against the pole looking at the stars. They were the very same ones the one curled up in his lap looked at with him all those years ago. After that night he had made the decision to stay in the past, naturally Sano had as well. He decided with his heart for once and not his head. It had been a hard transition into the new world, but it had all been worth it in the end. Two years later they were married. He had kept the promise to himself to take away her tears. He had wanted to be there for her, he never expected her to love him in return. She loved him for what he had been and what he was. She didn't look down on his past, she embraced it. She became his reason for living and he had never been happier. Because she had mated a demon before her lifespan had been lengthened. When they were married they were brought into the household of the west. The lord had trained her and treasured her, and because of it he wished to keep her happy. So made him and her other three friends apart of the house extending their lives as well. Him and her had adopted Shippou officially soon after their marriage. The kit had taken to him, and he to it. They had seen Japan through to the present and he had never broken his vow. He was able to help more people and that made him happy.

He couldn't have asked for a better life with someone who loved him fully, and friends turned family who accepted him. If someone had told him back in the revolution whether he thought he ever would have or deserved the life he had now he would have slain them for just being stupid…

ooOOoo

A/N: The end, really this time. I can add this one to my growing list of random crossovers. I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out, and hope you enjoyed it. I've been re watching rurouni kenshin recently and that's were this came from. I absolutely love him lol. Okay enough of my babbling, please review and tell me what you think!


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